“Aleikhem shalôm,” tripped off her tongue in heedless answer. Then, as if grown conscious I had said something strange, she paused and looked at me, and I instinctively became aware she was a Hebrew maiden. Yet I had still the feeling that I must get back to Vicenza.
“How far is thy servant from the city?” I asked in my best Hebrew.
“From Yerushalaim?” she asked in surprise. “But it is many parasangs. Impossible that thou shouldst arrive at Yerushalaim before the Passover, even borne upon eagles’ wings. Behold the sun—the Sabbath-Passover is nigh upon us.”
Ere she ended I had divined by her mispronunciation of the gutturals and by the Aramaic flavour of her phrases that she was a provincial and that I was come into the land of Canaan.
“What is this place?” I inquired, no less astonished than she.
“This is Nazara.”
“Nazara? Then am I in Galila?”
“Assuredly. Doubtless thou comest from the great wedding at Cana. But thou shouldst have returned by way of Mount Tabor and the town of Endor. Didst thou perchance see my mother at Cana?”
“Nay; how should I know thy mother?” I replied evasively.
She smiled. “Am I not made in her image? But overlong, meseems, have ye all feasted, for it is two days since we expect my mother and brothers.”